[Announce] Farmers in western Kansas running short on fuel

[Robert Waldrop]

This is curious yet disturbing news from Kansas. 
A combination of weather problems and refinery 
issues is causing western Kansas to run short on 
fuel just as their harvest looms.

Bob Waldrop, Romero House, OKC
>
> Full fields, empty tanks
> BY PHYLLIS JACOBS GRIEKSPOOR
> The Wichita Eagle
>
> Diesel shortage could hinder wheat harvest
>
> Forget about high fuel prices. As harvest nears 
> in western Kansas,
> the bigger concern is fuel supply. "I'm telling 
> our producers to get
> their tanks full," said Pat Peterson, general 
> manager of the United
> Plains Ag cooperative in Sharon Springs. "Supply 
> is more important
> than price."
>
> A shortage of diesel fuel supplies is the result 
> of a combination of
> weather and maintenance problems at refineries 
> and terminals in the
> region that have caused slowdowns in production 
> and problems with
> delivery.
>
> Storms the weekend of the Greensburg tornado 
> severely damaged the
> loading rack and two above-ground storage tanks 
> at the Magellan
> terminal near Great Bend.
>
> Refinery problems in Colorado and Oklahoma have 
> caused a short supply
> of fuel, leaving the Magellan terminal near 
> Scott City -- which
> supplies most of the cooperatives in an 80-mile 
> radius -- short of
> fuel. Problems in eastern Colorado have sent 
> producers there into
> Kansas looking for fuel, putting further 
> pressure on supplies at
> Scott City.
>
> When Scott City runs short, the first place 
> Kansas producers
> traditionally turn to is Great Bend. With the 
> terminal there shut
> down, the options are hauling fuel from the 
> Coffeyville Resources
> terminal at Phillipsburg or the NCRA refinery at 
> McPherson.
>
> Bruce Heine, a spokesman for Magellan, said the 
> company is doing the
> best it can to keep up with demand.
>
> "We are just the transportation company," he 
> said. "We have no
> control over the supply available."
>
> The company is assessing damage to the terminal 
> at Great Bend, Heine
> said, and weighing its options when it comes to 
> a decision to rebuild.
>
> Problems in the system
>
> Ken Peterson with the Kansas Petroleum Council 
> said the problem with
> supplies are systemwide and are driven by the 
> same forces that sent
> gasoline prices above $3 earlier this spring.
>
> "Anytime you have a disruption, it ripples 
> through the system," he
> said. "There have been refinery fires and 
> outages as well as the
> terminal problems at Great Bend. It all adds up 
> to a short supply."
>
> With the region looking at what appears to be 
> its best wheat harvest
> in a decade, producers are increasingly 
> concerned about having enough
> fuel to keep the combines and trucks rolling.
>
> This year's harvest is estimated at 400 million 
> bushels statewide.
> With prices around $5 a bushel, the crop could 
> be worth close to $2
> billion.
>
> Co-op manager Pat Peterson said the shortages 
> are likely to affect
> most of the western third of Kansas -- the area 
> expected to have the
> heaviest wheat harvest.
>
> Hauling diesel fuel by truck, he said, will 
> drive the price up -- 
> about 8 to 9 cents a gallon if it comes from 
> McPherson, or 5 cents
> from Phillipsburg.
>
> "We know that it's not really anybody's fault. 
> You can't control the
> weather," Peterson said. "But it really is 
> frustrating."
>
> At Goodland, Frontier Ag petroleum manager 
> Dennis Taylor said
> supplies are a huge concern with harvest 
> approaching.
>
> "We just merged with another cooperative about 
> the same size, so now
> were about a $130 million co-op with 13 or 14 
> fueling locations,"
> Taylor said. "We go through a lot of diesel fuel 
> and it will go up
> big time when harvest starts."
>
> He said the terminals at Scott City and 
> Phillipsburg have both run
> out of fuel in recent weeks, forcing them to 
> send trucks all the way
> to McPherson for fuel.
>
> "It's a four-hour drive one-way," he said. "With 
> the restrictions on
> driving hours, that means only one truckload a 
> day can come back.
> When harvest comes, there won't be enough trucks 
> or hours in the day
> to keep up."
>
> Long lines in McPherson
>
> The NCRA refinery at McPherson has seen long 
> lines and long waits for
> truck drivers, said Dana Kresky, manager of 
> product distribution.
>
> "We noticed it immediately when the terminal at 
> Great Bend went
> down," he said.
>
> He said the problem has been made worse by 
> refinery problems in
> Oklahoma that have left the terminal at Turpin, 
> Okla., short of fuel.
>
> "That terminal serves a lot of southwestern 
> Kansas -- Garden City,
> Liberal, that area," Kresky said. "With Turpin 
> down, those areas have
> to go elsewhere. Normally, that would be Great 
> Bend. With it down,
> they just have to keep coming farther."
>
> There are not a lot of choices when it comes to 
> terminals in western
> Kansas. Scott City, Phillipsburg and Great Bend 
> are the only ones
> west of Salina.
>
> Other options include Hutchinson, Wichita, 
> Valley Center or
> Concordia -- all long trips for truckers in 
> western Kansas.
>
> The loading rack at McPherson has been pumping 
> about 28,000 barrels a
> day -- about 1.1 million gallons, Kresky said. 
> At 8,000 gallons per
> truckload, that's nearly 140 trucks a day.
>
> He said the best advice he can offer western 
> Kansas truckers is to
> time their arrival in the nighttime hours when 
> there is less of a
> wait.
>
> "If they get here at 2 in the morning, they can 
> probably move right
> through," he said.
>
> The terminal, which processes about 38,000 
> barrels a day, also ships
> by pipeline into western Kansas. He said the 
> refinery will be
> running "strong and hard" through the harvest 
> season.
>
> The most disturbing aspect of the current 
> situation is that terminals
> are running out of fuel and the lines are 
> long --  and harvest has yet
> to begin.
>
> "We are trying to stock up and encourage 
> everybody to store what they
> can," said Taylor, of Frontier Ag in Goodland. 
> "But it's going to go
> fast when harvest starts.
>
> "It's a scary thought to think about combines or 
> trucks at the side
> of the field waiting on fuel. When that happens, 
> it's the retailer
> who takes the heat. And that's us."
>
> Reach P.J. Griekspoor at 316-268-6660 or at
> pgriekspoor at wichitaeagle.com.
>
>
>
>
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